An abundance of versatile undergarments

I have done quite well in organizing my closet space and decluttering.  It is difficult to part with items I find attractive even if they are a poor fit but I always manage to purge them eventually.

If only the same could be said of my sock and underwear drawer.  Long ago when I discovered I am happier with ankle socks I bought them in multi-packs.  Sometimes a dozen in a pack. I can count at lease 12 pairs each of two styles of socks I no longer wear because I subsequently found others I like much better.  And this is only my spring, summer and autumn sock collection.  The drawer below contains wool socks (another recent fetish) of which there must be 24 pairs of various styles.  This is absurd, and as bad as it is, my underwear collection is worse!

First, keep in mind that I am the guy who wears underwear on Saturdays and Sundays during lunch outings and whatever errands need to be run.  On the rare weekday when I need to venture out for anything I can put on the pair I wore over the weekend since they had, at most, about 4 hours of usage. Basically what I am saying is that 3 pairs could easily suffice for a month.  I probably have four dozen!  But here’s the thing:  a lot of them are technically not underwear per se.  

I went through this phase where I stocked up on various pairs of thin jogging shorts because they are comfortable, they can be worn as underwear, but also be worn around the house because hey, at that point they’re jogging shorts, right?  Handy for when I need to go to the door to dismiss a Jehovah’s Witness or some guy wanting to pave my driveway.  I don’t know how this developed.  Maybe I liked the idea of versatility, like if I went to a party wearing jeans and everyone else was wearing jogging shorts, I could just pull my jeans off and one uncomfortable problem would be solved.  Of course that would probably be the ONE time I had chosen to put on the ultra sheer pair that have no liner.  Basically the underwear that should have underwear under them.

I clearly had an underwear fetish at some point because there are just SO many.  And if I ever found a pair that I thought were a tad erotic and sexy and felt great, then why not have five of them in various colours?  That is the mindset that has always led to trouble.  I have synthetic briefs, cotton briefs, synthetic tight boxers, tight cotton boxers, loose cotton boxers, plan and patterned briefs, plain and patterned boxers, and then the jogging collection with some in a silky material and some in a kite-like fabric which are rather noisy when walking through the house.  Then there is the set of cheap Chinese-made shorts with a built-in jock strap that can serve multiple purposes.  I learned this when I ordered a pair of swim trunks awhile back in the colours of the Swedish flag.  Then I ordered some “workout shorts” in various colours and discovered they were identical in every respect to the swim trunks I had ordered.  And voila!  Now I had seven or eight swim trunks when I only really need two.  Great!

One solution to this problem would be to take up daily jogging/swimming/working out.  Since that is unlikely to happen I need to make some choices.  Why not just keep ONE of something I like in each style as opposed to having five of them in each style?  And why not have a maximum of four or five pairs of underwear that are marketed as, and function as, real underwear?  In the unlikely event that I have worn them all prior to wash day and I need another pair, I have proven that I can cope with any number of the other multi-purpose options.

Another solution would be to simply start wearing undies again.  In fact, I am giving it a trial run as I type this.